Legendary Billy Joe Royal

SKYE JACKSON was born and raised in New Orleans. She holds an English degree from LSU and a degree in law from Mississippi College School of Law. She is currently an MFA candidate in poetry at the University of New Orleans Creative Writing Workshop where she serves as Associate Poetry Editor of Bayou Magazine. Her work has appeared in the Delta Literary Journal and Thought Catalog. Her chapbook A Faster Grave was published in May 2019 from Antenna Press. BENJAMIN ALESHIRE travels the world as a poet-for-hire, composing poems for strangers on a manual typewriter. His work has been featured recently in The Times UK, Iowa Review, Boston Review, and on television in the US, China, and Spain. An excerpt of his novel, 'Poet for Hire: Kismet of a 21st Century Troubadour' is forthcoming in LitHub. Ben was a Breadloaf waiter in 2016, and serves as assistant poetry editor for the Green Mountains Review. He lives in New Orleans. www.poetforhire.org

Mystical K and Magical B Discuss How to Live a Better Life in Harsh Times

Larissa Shmailo's new collection of poetry is In Paran (BlazeVOX [books] 2009). Larissa is the winner of the 2009 New Century Music Awards for spoken word with jazz, electronica, and rock; her poetry CDs are Exorcism (SongCrew 2008) and The No-Net World (SongCrew 2006). Larissa's translation of the Russian transrational opera Victory over the Sun is part of the collections of the New York Museum of Modern Art (MOMA), the Hirsshorn Museum of the Smithsonian Institute, and the Los Angeles County Museum of Modern Art. She has been published in numerous journals and anthologies, including Barrow Street, Rattapallax, and Fulcrum.

Peter Buffett, a well-established composer/producer, has released his third vocal album, IMAGINARY KINGDOM. Born in Omaha, Nebraska, Buffett began his career in San Francisco writing music for commercials. He has eight released albums on Narada, Epic and Hollywood labels as well as six releases on his own label - including the EMMY award winning CD, Ojibwe. Buffett also composed and produced the score for the Duncan Group production of WISCONSIN – AN AMERICAN PORTRAIT, a regional EMMY award winner. Highlights of his film and television work include the Fire Dance scene in the Oscar winning film Dances With Wolves, and the score for 500 Nations, the eight-hour miniseries for CBS produced by Kevin Costner. Buffett's theatrical production, Spirit – The Seventh Fire, originally launched as a successful PBS pledge event, was located on the National Mall for the Smithsonian's opening of the National Museum of the American Indian. As co-chairman of the NoVo Foundation, Buffett helps guide the strategic plan that he and his wife Jennifer will implement with a small dedicated staff over the coming years. http://peterbuffett.com http://youtube.com/isound1

Diagnosed with advanced colon cancer on her birthday in 2005, Sylvia Thompson discovered the healing power of creative writing through her illness. She teaches meditation, Reiki, Chakra and Color Therapy and takes part in a women's Kabbalah study group in her community. Her book "In the Garden of Illness I sit by the Well of Hope" is available through SHADOW POETRY or you may have a special expanded version printed just for you through LULU. For more samples of Sylvia's poetry go to Author's Den. Her book is also available at Barnes and Noble.com and Amazon.com Check out her web site at http://myspace.com/thompsonpoetry

David Biespiel was born in Tulsa, Oklahoma in 1964 and grew up in Houston, Texas. He has degrees from Boston University and the University of Maryland. A former NCAA scholarship diver who competed in the United States National Diving Championships, he continues to coach national, international and Olympic-caliber divers. The recipient of the Academy of American Poets Prize, the Individual Artist Award in Poetry from the Maryland Arts Council and a Wallace Stegner Fellowship, Biespiel has taught at several colleges, including Stanford University. He now lives in Portland, Oregon, where he is Director and Writer-in-Residence of The Attic Writers’ Workshop and also teaches at Oregon State University. Biespiel’s second book of poems, Wild Civility, was published in 2003 by University of Washington Press in a new series edited by Linda Bierds. His first book of poems, Shattering Air, was published by BOA Editions in 1996. He writes a monthly poetry column for The Oregonian and edits the recently revived Poetry Northwest, once revered as the longest-running poetry-only journal in the United States, and now back in print in a new format.

Buffett's full-bodied electronic sound and rock-influenced accessibility make his music a congenial transition between the lighter pop instrumentals that have flooded the market and artists who are pushing the boundaries of modern electronic music with more challenging fare. The Nebraska-born pianist went to Stanford University, where he converted his Bay Area apartment into an efficient recording studio that provides soundtracks for numerous advertising, television, and film companies. Upon hearing of Kevin Costner's plans to create the movie Dances with Wolves, Buffett sent the actor a copy of his album One by One, which featured several cuts inspired by the plight of Native Americans. Costner was impressed enough to use some of Buffett's music in the film. Buffett's four Narada recordings combine a flair for drama and cinematic-style electronic orchestrations with his interest in Native American cultures. His later albums feature a progressively more prominent use of acoustic timbres, both sampled and authentic. ~ Linda Kohanov, All Music Guide (This podcast was originally posted in the Fall of 2006.)

From Bryan's Bio: “Born Manchester. Educated Bolton School and King’s College. Cambridge. Degree in English. At The Times as Financial News Editor and Deputy Arts Editor from 1976 to 1984. Freelance journalist ever since. Three times won Feature Writer of the Year and twice commended in the British Press Awards. Have contributed to, among others, Times, Sunday Times, Daily Telegraph, Spectator, Times Literary Supplement, The Tablet, New York Times, Vanity Fair etc. I am currently a special feature writer, commentator, reviewer and columnist for The Sunday Times. My books are: The Culture Club: Crisis in the Arts, Richard Rogers: a biography, The Pleasures of Peace: Art and Imagination in Postwar Britain, Understanding the Present: Science and the Soul of Modern Man, The First Church of the New Millennium: a novel, Brave New Worlds: Genetics and the Human Experience (winner of a medical writing prize whose name I cannot remember); Aliens: Why They Are Here and How to Live forever or Die Trying. I have lectured, debated or taught numerous universities, including Boston, St Andrews, Glasgow, Leeds, Cambridge, Oxford, Trinity College, Dublin, London, Liverpool John Moores, Architectural Association, Glasgow School of Architecture and I have been a fellow of the World Economic Forum.”.

Internationally renowned as a performance poet, Patricia Smith is four-time national individual champion of the notorious and wildly popular poetry slam, an energized competition where poets are judged on the content and performance of their work. She is also regarded as one of the few performance poets whose work translates effortlessly to the page. Indeed, the Small Press Review declares, "Smith writes the way Tina Turner sings." Smith's most recent collection, Teahouse of the Almighty , was chosen by Ed Sanders for the 2005 National Poetry Series, and was published by Coffee House Press in 2006. Her three previous books of poetry are, Close to Death (Zoland Books), Big Towns, Big Talk (Zoland Books), and Life According to Motown (Tia Chucha). She has won the prestigious Carl Sandburg Award, as well as a literary award from the Illinois Arts Council and an honorary degree from the John Jay College of Criminal Justice. In 2006, she was inducted into the International Hall of Fame for Writers of African Descent, putting her in the company of Zora Neale Hurston, Toni Morrison, James Baldwin, Langston Hughes, Alice Walker, and others. She was featured in the nationally-released film "Slamnation", and was a featured poet on the award-winning HBO series "Def Poetry Jam." Smith has shared the stage with Adrienne Rich, Rita Dove, Joyce Carol Oates, Allen Ginsburg, Walter Mosley, Ntozake Shange, Gwendolyn Brooks, Galway Kinnell and Viggo Morgensen. An author of prose as well poetry, Smith wrote Africans in America (Harcourt Brace), a chronicle of slavery in this country and the companion volume to the groundbreaking four-part PBS series.

Peter Krok is the editor of the Schuylkill Valley Journal and serves as the humanities/poetry director of the Manayunk Art Center where he has coordinated a literary series since 1990. His poems have appeared in more than seventy publications including the Yearbook of American Poetry, America, Midwest Quarterly, Poet Lore, Potomac Review, and in 2005 his poem "10 PM At a Philadelphia Recreation Center" was included in Common Wealth: Contemporary Poets on Pennsylvania (published by Penn State University). His book Looking For An Eye was published by the Foothills Press.